Halloween Read: “Every House is Haunted” by Ian Rogers

Every story in Every House is Haunted is like an eerie short film. There are haunted houses, sci-fi experiments, and psychic powers. What ties everything together is Rogers’ cinematic, absorbing style, and great ear for dialogue. You’re dropped into these little snapshots of surreal horror, which makes them all the weirder and memorable. It’s like watching The Twilight Zone.

A cat goes to great lengths to be of service to his household. An odd sort of spider infests a house through the TV set. A haunted house is so dangerous it’s on a paranormal watch list. A group of explorers set forth into the gray boundary between life and death. A mysterious facility in the desert deals in ancient, dangerous boundary-breaking. A man inherits the old family house…along with its long-buried secrets.

And that’s just a taste. There are twenty-two stories in this quirky collection. A lot of them would be perfect Halloween read-alouds. Surreal, entertaining, deftly told, this collection has a Halloween treat for everyone.